[Page 317]

CORYDON:

A PASTORAL.

To the Memory of WILLIAM SHENSTONE, Esq

BY THE SAME.
I.
1 COME, shepherds, we'll follow the hearse,
2 We'll see our lov'd Corydon laid,
3 Tho' sorrow may blemish the verse,
4 Yet let a sad tribute be paid.
[Page 318]
5 They call'd him the pride of the plain;
6 In sooth he was gentle and kind!
7 He mark'd on his elegant strain
8 The graces that glow'd in his mind.
II.
9 On purpose he planted yon trees,
10 That birds in the covert might dwell;
11 He cultur'd his thyme for the bees,
12 But never wou'd rifle their cell.
13 Ye lambkins that play'd at his feet,
14 Go bleat — and your master bemoan;
15 His music was artless and sweet,
16 His manners as mild as your own.
III.
17 No verdure shall cover the vale,
18 No bloom on the blossoms appear;
19 The sweets of the forest shall fail,
20 And winter discolour the year.
21 No birds in our hedges shall sing,
22 (Our hedges so vocal before)
23 Since he that should welcome the spring,
24 Can greet the gay season no more.
IV.
25 His Phillis was fond of his praise,
26 And poets came round in a throng;
27 They listen'd, — they envy'd his lays,
28 But which of them equal'd his song?
[Page 319]
29 Ye shepherds, henceforward be mute,
30 For lost is the pastoral strain;
31 So give me my Corydon's flute,
32 And thus — let me break it in twain.

Text

  • TEI/XML [chunk] (XML - 74K / ZIP - 7.8K) / ECPA schema (RNC - 357K / ZIP - 73K)
  • Plain text [excluding paratexts] (TXT - 1.2K / ZIP - 906 )

Facsimile (Source Edition)

(Page images digitized from a copy in the Bodleian Library [Harding C 148].)

Images

PDF

All Images (PDF - 1.4M)

About this text

Title (in Source Edition): CORYDON: A PASTORAL.
Author: John Cunningham
Themes: rural life; poetry; literature; writing; death
Genres: pastoral
References: DMI 28995

Text view / Document view

Source edition

Mendez, Moses. A collection of the most esteemed pieces of poetry: that have appeared for several years. With variety of originals, by the late Moses Mendez, Esq; and other contributors to Dodsley's collection. To which this is intended as a supplement. London: printed for Richardson and Urquhart, 1767, pp. 317-319. [8],320p. ; 8⁰. (ESTC T124631; DMI 1073; OTA K099398.000) (Page images digitized from a copy in the Bodleian Library [Harding C 148].)

Editorial principles

The text has been typographically modernized, but without any silent modernization of spelling, capitalization, or punctuation. The source of the text is given and all editorial interventions have been recorded in textual notes. Based on the electronic text originally produced by the TCP project, this ECPA text has been edited to conform to the recommendations found in Level 5 of the Best Practices for TEI in Libraries version 4.0.0.